


Loft Funster

by Keibell



Series: Modern Times Rock ‘N’ Roll [2]
Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Gen, a trip down memory lane lmao, getting druunnkk, loft means attic in british, mostly just good feelings, old clothes, slight angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-11-15 20:04:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18080033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keibell/pseuds/Keibell
Summary: Roger invites you over to his house, and you find him in the attic surrounded by old clothes. You two decide to get drunk and look through them all.





	Loft Funster

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheNightComesDown](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheNightComesDown/gifts).



> modern times is back y'all!! pls feel free to request anything on my Tumblr @rhapso-kei !!

_“DAAAD! Y/N’S HERE!”  
_

_“TELL THEM I’M UPSTAIRS!”_

“He’s upstairs.”

Lola Leng Taylor rolls her eyes at you playfully as she shifts the front door, letting you step inside the Taylor family house. It’s very _Roger_ , which you suppose makes sense, but it still has that distinctive homey charm to it - his kids’ heights through the years scribbled onto a doorframe, pictures and knick-knacks littering various surfaces.

“I’m going out, I’ll be back later!” She calls, grabbing at a jacket on a hook and stepping through the doorway. Roger and another female voice call their farewells, and Lola waves at you before shutting the door after her. There’s a clattering of ceramic from the kitchen and you pass through the living room to greet Sarina, where she smiles brightly at you, standing up from her squat in front of the dishwasher.

“Hi, I’m-“

“I know who you are - hello, sweetheart! The infamous B!” She chimes, stepping closer to squeeze you in a quick hug, and you chuckle. It seems like your nickname has spread into your personal life now, despite the actual coining of it happening months ago, when you’d zoned out during a rehearsal. Sarina shifts, and then exclaims at the sound of crinkled plastic wrap. “Oh, that’s so lovely, thank you!”

You look down at the bouquet of flowers and wine bag you held in your hand. You’d forgotten about them, to be honest with yourself, but you smile bashfully and hold them out to her. You’d never really been to anyone’s house like this before; all of your friends were poor students and lived in shitty flats practically on top of each other - there’d never been any reason to bring a gift when you visited unless it was a bottle of vodka or some beer, or something. Your mum had insisted over the phone upon you bringing them something, even if it was only small, so you settled on a bunch of flowers that had sat awkwardly in your lap the whole ride down to Roger’s house, and a bottle of wine in a neat-looking little bag. You thank her for letting you come in, and she sets about putting the flowers in a vase before there’s another noise.

“ _B! UPSTAIRS!_ ” Roger bellows, his voice echoing through the foyer and Sarina laughs to herself, nodding at you. You’re stood stiffly in the kitchen, not wanting to keep Roger waiting, but also not wanting to ditch her. The handle of your bass guitar case twists nervously in your clammy hands.

“Go on then, before he bursts a blood vessel or something. Take that with you too, he’ll want to be the one to open it.” She chuckles, pointing to the wine bottle, and you thank her, picking it up before leaving the kitchen and climbing the stairs to the upper floor - where Roger was nowhere to be seen.

“Roger?”

“Round the corner!” You turn the corner, tucked away behind a wall, and you’re face to face with a dusty ladder leading up into a hole in the ceiling. It’s the entrance to his loft, you realise, and you cock an eyebrow, barely suppressing a snort.

“ _Are you in the loft?_ ”

“Get up here.” A single, tattooed hand appears through the hole and waves about urgently before vanishing again. You sigh, setting your case down and climbing up the rickety ladder, hauling yourself into the loft with a soft huff. It’s surprisingly spacious up there, clean and well lit - not cluttered and cramped with shit you didn’t even recognise, like yours. Then again, you think you’d only been up into your attic once, and it had sat unused ever since you moved in and stuffed a bunch of junk the old tenants left up there, out of the way.

“Good morning to you too, Rog.” You groan, uprighting yourself and brushing off your clothes, the dust particles sparkling and swirling in the air.

“Yeah, yeah, morning whatever - _get over here and look at this!_ ” He’s excited, burying his arms into a box and rooting around noisily. There are piles of old cardboard boxes stacked neatly against the perimeter of the room, and Roger has started smack bang in the middle of it. Getting closer, you see what he’s looking at.

Boxes and boxes of old clothes.

“Are they yours?”

“Yes!” He’s ecstatic at this point, shovelling aside handfuls of silken shirts and colourful fabrics, and it’s kind of endearing. You don’t know what he’s quite looking for, but you settle down on your knees next to him, as his legs are stretched out in front of him, his socks adorned with a bright pattern you realise is just numerous fists with their middle fingers raised. “Go on, get stuck in!”

“Roger, I thought you needed me to do some some stuff for the tour tomorrow.” You say, scratching at the back of your neck awkwardly. “I brought my bass and flowers and everything.” 

“Nevermind that, Y/N, _look at all this shite!_ ”

“It’s not shite!” You protest, watching him fiddle with a baggy, brown hat, and he chuckles to himself before turning to you, setting it on your head. It does _not_ suit you, but it does look familiar. It’s the hat he wore for most of the press in the ‘75 Japan tour, you realise, and you pull a face. Somehow, it’s almost uglier in person.

“Good, ‘cause I want you to have it.”

You pause. “This hat? ‘Cause this _is_ shite.”

“No, no! _The clothes!_ ” He pulls out something else, a plaid shirt from a photo-shoot in the eighties you think you recognise, which he quickly once-overs before tossing it to you. You catch it, holding the fabric up in front of you to examine the seams. “Brian gave his ‘ _Live Aid_ ’ jeans to Gwilym to wear in the film, and I felt bad because I couldn’t give Ben anything of mine.”

“What? Why?”

“He’s a lot more muscular than I was - why do you think I wanted him to play me? Got legs like tree trunks.” Roger seems sheepish, giving you a cheeky grin and a wink, to which you snort, choking out a laugh. “I was a fucking twig back in the day.”

“I wouldn’t say you were a twig.” You hum, unbuttoning the shirt he’d given you and pulling it around your shoulders. It was designed to be oversized, so it wouldn’t look too bad tucked into a pair of high-waisted jeans or shorts, maybe with a top underneath it? Either way, you could probably make it look good.

“Oh, you’ve been looking at old photos, have you?” He teases, and you sputter, carefully removing the hat and placing it into the quickly-forming pile of clothes at Roger’s side.

“I play bass for you, I have to know the history!” You defend yourself, not quite wanting to let on to how deep you’d fallen into the world of Queen. It was bad enough that you could already pinpoint a year that a _hat_ was from. “And half of this stuff won’t fit me.”

“Why not?!”

“Roger. We have completely different body shapes.”

“B, I want you to have it because you could do _something_ with it. Better than it being stuck in a loft. Make it young and fresh again - like you've done with me and Brian.” He says with his head buried in a box, and a warmth spreads through your chest at his praise. You hadn’t really considered the impact you’d had on them - in fact, you’d thought you’d be relatively insignificant to them - but they were so incredibly welcoming and caring for you, and there was never a day you weren’t grateful for it.

“ _Oh._ ” You fiddle with the buttons of the shirt, almost shy. “Thank you, Roger.”

“Besides, I’m too fat for it all now anyway.” He waves his hand flippantly, taking his head out of the box to puff out a breath. You’re about to protest again before his eyes dart to the bag at your side. “Did you bring wine?”

“Yeah, my mum-“

“ _Come on then_ , let’s crack it open!”

-

A bottle of wine shared between the two of you (and then a bottle of champagne Roger had found from a few Christmases ago and deemed safe to drink) later, you and Roger were sprawled out on the floor of his loft, covered in random scarves and hats you’d uncovered from his archives. The two of you weren’t drunk, just teetering on the end of tipsy, but Roger was ranting at you, the Elizabethan ruff from the ‘ _It’s a Hard Life_ ’ video strapped around his neck. You had the silver horse head from John’s ensemble in your arms, cradled softly like a sparkly, equine baby.

“We look so _bloody_ stupid in that video, B, _honestly_.” He’s barely pausing to take a breath now, moving his hands around wildly, and you nod solemnly, your torso swaying with the motion of it. “I’m _sure_ the director was taking the piss, _I’m sure of it_ -“

“ _You looked great!_ ” He did, but you could clearly see the hatred burning in his eyes every second of the video. John looked equally fed up, but you enjoyed the extravagance of his outfit, something you often tried to replicate in your own on-stage style. He was always pretty fashionable - at least in your eyes - you couldn’t fathom how many times you’d looked for a pair of canary-yellow jeans, only to turn up nothing.

“I _loathed_ it! I don’t even know why I kept this fucking thing - I’m surprised I didn’t burn it the second they let me out of there!”

Roger takes another swig at the champagne, before passing it over to you, and you follow suit, letting the bubbles fizz on your tongue. He rips the collar off, launching it into the corner of the attic, and you look down into the box that’s in front of you, taking out the t-shirt on the top. It’s big and baggy, with ‘ _Choose Life_ ’ printed on the front of it in bold, black letters - from the ‘ _Hammer to Fall_ ’ video, you think.

“A ‘ _Trainspotting_ ’ reference?” You ask, and Roger shakes his head with vigour.

“‘ _Trainspotting’?!_ It’s ‘ _Wham!_ ’” He scoffs, waving about his arms. “Those t-shirts were massive in the eighties.”

“Well, excuse me for mixing up my ‘ _choose life_ ’ slogans!” You shoot back, before tossing the shirt onto the pile next to Roger. “What’s wrong with ‘ _Trainspotting_ ’? It’s a good film!”

“Dunno. Never got around to seeing it.”

“You’d _love_ it! It’s got drugs, tits, and bar-fights! It’s a classic!” You’re babbling at him, and he’s nodding intently, eyes sparkling with amusement at the way you tipsily stumble over your words.

“We’ll have to watch it then.”

You instantly sour.

“I’m not watching it with _you!_ ” You pull a face, and Roger is about to splutter in offence before you talk over him. “There’s a sex scene in it, it’d be weird!”

“ _I’ve had sex!_ ”

“ _And I don’t want to know about it!_ ” Your fingers are immediately jammed into your ears, and he turns away with a huff, picking his way through plain shirts and trousers. Your attention is returned to the box in front of you, where you pick out the clothes on top. You find his blue shirt from the ‘ _One Vision_ ’ video and check with Roger before adding it to the pile of things officially being bestowed upon you. So far it includes a few random bits and pieces; his green jacket from the ‘ _Don’t Stop Me Now_ ’ video, a bandana, an old leather jacket, his striped shirt from ‘ _The Miracle_ ’, and a pair of clogs that - _strangely_ \- fit you perfectly. Roger couldn’t remember where they were from.

“You’re lucky Brian hasn’t gotten you a pair yet.” He snickers, and you pout at him.

“ _You leave Brian’s clogs alone!_ I’m gonna wear them to surprise him, and then we can match.” You say indignantly, picking up a black jacket with pale flowers embroidered into the fabric, before slipping it on. “I recognise this... I thought it was Freddie’s?”

“I honestly have no clue.” Roger shrugs, dumping a handful of tangled necklaces onto the floor. You take the jacket off, deciding to leave that one for Roger. “We all sort of shared stuff back in the day - it could have been anyone’s. I wore it, Brian wore it, Fred wore it. John always liked to do his own thing when it came to clothes.”

“At least he didn’t wear _these_.” There’s a pair of hideous lime green jeans in your hands, and Roger is visibly repulsed by them. The legs are a little tight, but you could always cut them off and make an obnoxious pair of shorts with them. They’re almost luminescent, glowing in the light of the loft, and you decide you must have them immediately.

“Yeah, take those vile shits. The sooner I get rid of those, the better.”

You nod, placing the jeans in your pile and looking back into the box with a gasp, finally seeing the treasure you had uncovered.

“Holy shit, _vinyls_!” You chirrup, flicking through the card casings to each single, yellowed and creased with age. Roger leans over to peer in, exclaiming in excitement and picking one out. He pulls a blanket off of a structure in the corner to reveal a record player, and he shuffles over to it on his knees to play the record. A bassline thrums through the attic, followed by a steady drumbeat and a familiar voice. You recognise the song, ‘ _Start!_ ’ by ‘ _The Jam_ ’, and you laugh, your fingers automatically moving to the correct notes on where your bass would be if it was in your hands.

“You know this?” He asks over the crackle of the music, and you grin, nodding.

“My first band was a ‘ _The Jam_ ’ cover band called ‘ _The Marmalade_ ’.” You confess, your face flushing red from embarrassment, and Roger cackles. You guzzle from the champagne again, before pointing a finger at him. “Don’t laugh! We thought we were clever!”

“That’s fucking _hilarious_.” He crows, absolutely overjoyed, before replicating the percussion by drumming his hands on his lap. “I haven’t seen these in ages! How fantastic is this?! Forty-five revolutions per minute - can’t go wrong!”

“ _And my rock ‘n’ roll forty-fives._ ” You sing, lowering your voice to a crooning gravel to mimic Roger’s on the ' _Sheer Heart Attack_ ' track. You, unfortunately, hadn’t been part of the vinyl generation. At the very least, your earliest memories of music all involved chunky cassettes, and you doubt that Roger had any of those lying around.

Roger parrots the line you just sang absent-mindedly, before frowning, furrowing his eyebrows.

“That’s good, that - what’s it from?” He asks, and you break into peals of laughter, to which Roger stifles a drunken giggle. “Why you laughing?”

“‘ _Tenement Funster’_!” You gasp between chuckles, and Roger’s face drops immediately, causing you to throw your head back and laugh even harder. “How do you forget your own song?!”

“ _Oh_ , that’s embarrassing.” He groans loudly, rubbing at his cheek and flushing red. There are tears pricking at his eyes from laughter, and he swipes them away, his shoulders shaking with giggles. “Look at me, I’m doing a John.”

The music picks up, and you throw your hands up, dancing to the beat from the floor, and Roger cackles, looking back into the box before letting out a gasp, flinging himself back like he’d been burnt, and then immediately diving his hands back in.

“Oh, no! What in the merry, everloving piss are _those_?” His eyes look sorrowful, and he pouts at you, causing you to furrow your eyebrows in confusion.

And then he pulls out the sparkliest, pinkest pair of shoes you’ve ever seen, and you gasp in awe.

“They’re beautiful.”

“They’re _hideous!_ ” He squawks, simultaneously kicking off his own slippers and undoing the laces of the Converse. “I must put them on immediately!”

You laugh again, removing the scarf from around your neck and pushing your hair out of your face. You take another drink from the champagne, and stifle a hiccup as Roger laces up the glittery shoes and kicks his feet in the air, cheering triumphantly.

“They still fit!” He exclaims, and you make a drunken joke about children’s Skechers, causing the two of you to snicker for the next five minutes straight. You hand him the champagne, and he makes a show of crossing his legs, one ankle over the other in an extravagant way. He sips, and hiccups. “Am I beautiful yet?”

“Stunning.” You reply, trying your best to keep a straight face. It doesn’t work. “ _And that’s the tea._ ”

“The _what?_ ”

“The truth.”

-

The champagne is finished by the time you reach the really good stuff; iconic bits and pieces that Roger had packed away carefully for safekeeping. He has on the rainbow-coloured curly wig from a photo you’d seen knocking around, and you have on his leather flat cap from the beginning of the ‘ _A Kind of Magic_ ’ music video.

“Why were you wearing this? Who did you think you were? _Oliver Twist?_ ” You tease him, and he collapses into laughter, snickering playfully. “That bloke from ‘ _Mary Poppins_ ’?! Give us a bit of ‘ _Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious_ ’, Rog!”

You don’t know what word you just said, but it definitely wasn’t ‘supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’. The two of you fall about like a pair of rolling eggs - you’re both hammered at this point, faces flushed a warm pink, and your eyes glossy and half-lidded.

There’s a sparkly vest in your hands before you know it, and you recognise it from the ‘ _Keep Yourself Alive_ ’ video, letting out an exclamation before slipping it over your shoulders.

“This was such a _look_.” You chatter, almost bouncing off of the ground in excitement. “What if I put a white shirt and black jeans with it, in homage to Brian? Maybe curl my hair?”

“You’d have to grow a few inches, the fucking tree.”

“He can’t help being a tree, Roger.” You huff in mock indignation, and he snorts, pulling out a tangle of red strips of fabric.

“Oh, _shite_ , I think this is supposed to be my ‘ _Radio Ga Ga_ ’ costume.” He cringes, clumsily trying to unknot the cloth from itself. “Clearly, I was in a bit of a rush when that shoot ended - I’m not surprised, with the amount of takes we had to do. Freddie had the lyric sheet and a vodka tonic in that bloody fake car with him the whole shoot.”

“So you didn’t have time to shag it, then?” The words are tumbling out of your mouth before you can even stop them, and Roger freezes, watching you clap a hand over your mouth.

“What? Shag what?”

“...The car.” You reply, almost sheepish, and Roger huffs, throwing his hands into the air.

“We’re not talking about this.” He scowls, and you snort loudly, the hat falling off of your head.

The door shuts from downstairs, and Lola calls out a greeting, which is echoed by Sarina from downstairs, and the friends she had invited around after her husband had decided upon locking himself in the loft all day. There’s the thumping of feet on the staircase, and Roger opens his mouth.

“ _Lo!_ ”

“Dad?” Her voice responds, and she pauses, her footsteps moving around as if she were looking for him. They come to a stop at the foot of the attic ladder. “Are you in the _loft?_ ”

“Indeed I am.”

“Are you _drunk_ in the _loft?_ ” She sounds incredulous, and you lie on your stomach to look over the edge of the trapdoor, peering down at Roger’s daughter. He follows suit. “Oh! Hi, Y/N.”

“Hellooo..!” You attempt to sound sober. _It doesn’t work._

“Lola, _my darling offspring_ , will you chuck us up some wine and a packet of crisps or something?” Roger asks, and Lola blinks at him, looking unimpressed.

“I can get you beer and a sarnie.” She offers, and he nods enthusiastically.

“Yes, please.” He chimes, and she turns to go back downstairs. Roger calls out after her, sticking his arm through and waving it around. “Love you, sweetheart!”

“Thank you, Lola!” You chorus after him, before sitting up again, the world beginning to spin around you. She returns five minutes later with her hoodie pockets stuffed full of beer bottles, and two bread rolls stuffed with sandwich fillings. The two of you babble at her happily, hanging out of the loft to receive the food before settling back up into the attic to eat. Roger uses an old guitar-shaped bottle opener he finds to open a beer bottle, taking a long drink.

“Lola is fucking sick, Rog.” You mumble around a mouthful of sandwich, and he hums appreciatively, nodding his head.

“She sure as shit is.”

-

Roger has attached a pair of old rainbow suspenders he found to his pyjama bottoms, and you’re holding the tight leather gold skirt he wore in Freddie’s ‘ _The Great Pretender_ ’ video, when he got in drag for the second time in front of millions of viewers.

“I looked gorgeous, B - don’t even lie to me, you know I did.” Roger hiccups, and you nod over and over again, up and down, up and down. The two of you are absolutely sloshed.

“You did - one hundred percent.” You agree with him, pulling up the sleeves on the jumper he’d pulled out of a pile and shoved on you as soon as he noticed the goosebumps on your arm. It was white, with the band caricatures from the ‘ _A Kind of Magic_ ’ album cover printed across the front. It smelt like the wings of a stage, a smell that apparently never changed - and you revelled in the now-familiarity in it. It smelt like home.

Roger pulls out and flings away an extravagant fur coat that seems to go on forever, and you watch it go sailing over your head with a drunken giggle. This is followed by a beautiful silk jacket, which you immediately spot and scramble after.

“Don’t throw that away, it’s gorgeous!” You cry, stretching out your arms to grab at it, and pull it to you, running the flats of your hands over the soft, slippery material. You recognise it from some photos, a champagne-coloured silk jacket printed with rich, shimmering images of birds and wings, soaring across the arms and pockets. “ _Oh, wow!_ Clothes are so fucking crazy - do you ever think about that?”

“No.” Roger replies immediately, moving onto the next box, which rattles promisingly. You slip the jacket onto your pile, and shuffle over to his side as he opens up the lid.

“Aha! We’ve hit the really good stuff now, B.” He pulls out a yellow-and-pink-striped tie, and you gasp, almost jumping off of the floor in excitement. “What?”

“Schoolgirl Roger!” You beam, stroking a delicate finger over the tie, and tapping the beat to ‘ _I Want To Break Free_ ’ on your leg, bobbing along. “She was so fucking iconic, I love her.”

“ _Oh shit, yeah!_ ” Roger says, and then grimaces, stuffing it back into the box. “Pretend like you never saw that - they asked if I still had the tie for the film and I thought I didn’t.”

“That’s why Ben ended up with a weird one? The colours were completely wrong.”

“ _Well!_ Too late now, innit?”

You find a tambourine, which you hit a few times for the sake of making noise, between giggling fits, and then you find a stack of magazines, each one with a picture of the band stamped on the front and needlessly railing them in the strap-line.

“Rog, why did you keep all these magazines being horrible about you?” You ask, while he’s flicking through an old issue of ‘ _Rolling Stone_ ’ and giggling to himself. You pick one out yourself, finding a two-page spread dedicated to mercilessly slating their ‘ _The Game_ ’ album. “This one’s from 1981.”

“Dunno. Motivation. Eventual revenge.” He pauses to chuckle, pointing at something on the page before looking back up at you, his nose wrinkled. “A laugh.”

“That’s the pettiest thing I’ve ever heard.”

He laughs, chucking the magazines back into the box, thrusting his hand in, closing it around something and frowning in confusion.

“ _What the fuck is that..?_ ” He huffs, and pulls out a kazoo, and two thimbles. They’re all together in a little sheer drawstring bag, with ‘S.R’ scrawled on the fabric in black ink. “Aha!”

“What does ‘S.R’ mean? What the fuck are the thimbles for?” You ask, hiccuping lightly and nearly falling over as you lean over to peer at it, examining the bag’s contents. Roger cheers, ripping the bag open and slipping his index and middle fingers into the thimbles, ‘playing’ them quickly on the floor to create a sharp tapping sound.

“‘ _Seaside Rendezvous_ ’.” He grins widely, and you gasp, recognising the noise from the instrumental halfway through the ‘ _Night At The Opera_ ’ track.

“ _Oh!_ The tap dancing from the trumpet-y bit!” You gush, “I didn't know you used thimbles for that!”

“Yeah! Here, hold these-!” He shoves the thimbles into your outstretched palm, and turns to rifle through some more boxes, eventually pulling out a battered, wooden ukulele. “You any good at playing one of these? I’m a bit shit.”

“Four strings is my speciality.” You beam, exchanging the thimbles in your hand for the instrument, running your fingers over the strings and fiddling with the pegs at the headstock to check the tuning. It was in relatively good condition, if not for a thick layer of dust on the frets. You pluck at the strings, placing chords along the neck and strumming a small tune.

“I love that song.” You say eventually, unable to stop the smile pulling at your cheeks. He looks up at you, from over his glasses frames - an old, ugly pair he found in a box that had a similar enough prescription to his current ones.

“How come?” He asks. You shrug, still smiling widely.

“It’s happy. _Makes me happy._ ”

“Makes me happy too. Me and Fred wrote it together after fucking about trying to distract Brian in the studio.” Roger goes silent and the two of you look at each other, eyes sparkling with mischief. Then he speaks.

“I have an idea.”

-

It’s messy, but you end up live-streaming the world’s most ridiculous, drunken ‘ _Seaside Rendezvous_ ’ cover on your phone, which had been propped up on an open box lid. You probably should have practised it beforehand, as the two of you are giggling the whole way through, botching harmonies and slipping up on chords, but you couldn’t care less. You’re wearing some stupid cowboy hat on your head, and Roger had opted for the curly clown wig again, a colourful scarf knotted around his forehead. It’s a travesty in terms of musicality (and you _almost_ _certainly_ butcher the French parts) as you’re both singing at the top of your voices, but Roger takes the lower notes with ease and shoves the kazoo clumsily in your mouth for the high parts in the instrumental break, your own hands occupied with playing the uke. Roger was ‘drumming’ with his hands on his legs, and performed the ‘tap’ section with the thimbles on the hardcover of an old biology textbook he’d found.

The cover ends with the two of you laughing so hard you double over, rolling around on the floor with your legs kicking in the air. Viewers of the live-stream hear you shriek an ‘ _oh shit!_ ’ as your phone tumbles from its makeshift holder into a box. You fumble with the buttons, and the stream ends with your confused muttering.

You’re still giggling to yourself as Roger pockets the thimbles, shoving his hand into the box, closing it around a handle and pulling out something new to look at. A teapot? Or maybe it was a hat? A teapot hat?

_Oh._

“Oh.” You say.

“Oh.” Roger echoes. His face has dropped, his mouth set in a straight line and his eyes filled with a soft kind of mourning, like a long-lasting pain. He looks _old_ for once - he never usually does - but now his wrinkles are set in his face deeper than ever, his eyebrows furrowed with an intensity you can’t quite place. Your own chest feels tight at the sight of the hat - the video for ‘ _I’m Going Slightly Mad_ ’ was lighthearted, but was one of Freddie’s last music video appearances before the horrible November day that you always tried not to think about.

Roger looks at the tea-kettle-hat fusion with utter adoration, the soft flicker of his eyelashes betraying the heartache still so close to the surface. He brushes the dust off of it with care - _gently_ , with the pads of his fingertips, the only parts of his hands not worn rough with drumming - and sets it delicately down back in the box.

“There’s something else in here.” He says, and you can’t find anything to say, even though your heart aches to comfort him. But what could you ever say to fix it? _You didn’t even meet Freddie._

You open your mouth - _though you’re not quite sure what you’re going to say_ \- but you’re interrupted by the jingling of bells as Roger takes John’s jester hat out of the cardboard. You didn’t want to think about why it wasn’t at John’s house, in _his_ attic - the events of 1991 had hit him harder than anyone ever let on in the press at the time - and your chest tightens.

He looks at it for a moment, with the same loving tenderness, before turning to you and holding it out.

“Take it.”

You shake your head softly. “Roger, I can’t-“

“ _Please._ ” His voice is like felt, cracking slightly as he pushes it towards you, the bells chiming softly.

_You take the hat._

The two of you lie back on the attic floor, the house below quiet and dark, as the afternoon had turned into evening, and then night. Roger’s family were probably asleep now, and you’re too drunk to drive yourself home. On the other hand, you were just drunk enough to sleep on the floor.

Trees rustle outside, and the soft patter of rain hits the window, where the moon is illuminated in a curve of silver light. You blink, your entire body feeling like it’s been filled with lead rather than blood and bone.

“Do you think they’d like me?” Your own slurred voice tumbles from your lips before you can even think about stopping yourself.

“Who?” He asks, but he already knows who you mean.

“Freddie and John.” Their names are foreign on your tongue - such a big part of your life, but you were never in theirs. _You couldn’t be._ Roger is quiet, mulling it over and then speaking up.

“They’d love you.” He decides, nodding his head from under the curly wig. “You’re driven, and hard-working, and passionate. You have a lot of love - to give, and also...”

You glance over at him, and he meets your gaze for the first time in a while, before he raises a finger and taps the middle of his chest, where his heart is.

“ _In here_ ,” Roger says. “From us, especially.”

His words are ringing around in your head, and you barely have time to reply before the immense fatigue weighing down your eyelids gets the best of you, and you pass out on the floor of Roger Taylor’s attic.

“G’night, Rog.”

“Night, Y/N.”

-

“...Where’s Roger?”

“In the loft.”

“ _In the loft?_ ”

“With B.”

Brian is stood in the middle of the foyer, looking at the staircase leading to the upper floor. Sarina is already dressed and showered, and Roger still hadn’t shown any sign of waking up when she last checked on him. She’d popped her head into the loft before she went to bed last night, taking the time to throw old blankets over them so they didn’t freeze themselves solid, and she found them the exact same way in the morning.

“Go and get them if you want, they just had a few too many last night.” She chuckles to herself, and watches Brian sigh, and begin the slow ascent of the stairs. He passes Lola on the landing, looking hungover herself, and she directs him down the hallway to find the ladder into the loft.

He only needs to climb a few rings before his head is through the trapdoor, and he’s at eye level with your sleeping form, your hair stuck to the drool creeping out of your mouth. Roger huffs in his sleep, mumbling incoherently, and Brian has to stop himself from laughing at the sight of him, passed out in a pile of glittery fabric and silk.

You wake up abruptly to the ‘ _click_ ’ of a photo being taken, and nearly scream when you see a mass of silver blocking your vision. Your eyes clear, and you see Brian staring back at you, smiling.

“Good morning.” He says, and Roger groans, stretching out his arms and legs.

“Who’s tha’?” His voice is hoarse and gravelly, gritty with fatigue and a hangover. Brian merely raises an eyebrow, clearly trying to stop his smile becoming a cocky smirk. “Y/N, where 're you?”

“‘M ‘ere, Rog.” Your own voice cracks, your mouth raspy and dry while your tongue feels fat and heavy in your mouth, your head pounding. _You regret bringing the wine._

“Rise and shine, you two,” Brian announces, and the two of you hiss and recoil at the volume of his voice, curling in on yourselves. “Hope you’re all ready and packed!”

“F’r wha’?” Roger grumbles, scratching at his beard and clearing his throat. Brian rolls his eyes, reaching out a long arm to poke at the drummer’s knee.

“We’re starting the next leg of the tour today!” He chimes, and your heart drops to your stomach. How could you have forgotten why you came over in the first place?

“Oh, _bollocks_.”

Your phone buzzes from beside you, and you look at the screen, having to blink a few times before the blur fizzes away.

‘ **@brianmayforreal tagged you in a photo: “These two have clearly been working hard on...”** ’

_Double bollocks._

-

It’s a week into the tour before you find a gift bag on your hotel room table, a note propped up against it with the letter ‘B’ written in beautiful looping handwriting on the front. You’d barely noticed it, flying into the room after a show and dumping your bass on the bed, unbuttoning the fluorescent green shorts that you’d cut from the hideous pair jeans you’d found in Roger’s attic. You were sweaty and exhausted and covered in glitter, and not expecting a gift bag, of all things.

It hadn’t been there that morning, you were sure of that - so where had it come from?

You pick up the note, swearing when you clumsily smear glitter paste and makeup onto the paper, before turning it over to read it.

‘ _He’d want you to have it. - R_ ’

 _Ah_ , so it was from Roger. You frown at the note, confused, before setting it down and pushing your hair out of your face, opening up the gift bag and pulling out a small box. A jewellery box. You frown deeper, still confused, and then you open it.

And then your frown melts away.

Inside is a single thimble, a necklace chain threaded through a hole drilled into the metal. You find yourself beaming, pulling the necklace out of the box and fastening it around your neck, fiddling with the thimble where it bumps against the top of your sternum. Tears prick at your eyes, a warm, fuzzy feeling starting up in your chest that seems to melt you from the inside and tingle in your nerve-endings, in a good way. _He’d want you to have it._

_Freddie._

You’re up and taking a flying leap at your bed faster than you know it, diving for the phone on the bedside table as your body ploughs into the pillows. You punch in the number for Roger’s room, and the line clicks as he answered, smugness practically radiating through the handset.

“So, you like it?” He asks, and you smile so big that it hurts, sniffing and wiping at the tears in your eyes.

“ _So très charmant, my dear._ ”


End file.
